| Headquarters: | Eridani FederationOfficially registered as an empty lot in the Eridani Federation. True HQ remains unknown. |
| Motto: | N/A |
| Founded: | 2200s |
| Major Sectors: | Medical, Robotics |
| Minor Sectors: |
| Affiliates: | |
| Rivals: | NanoTrasen |
Zeng-Hu Pharmaceuticals’ retinal implants returned Alesta Milana’s vision. After a flash of white and blinking away spots in her eyes she saw her son’s face for the first time in twenty years.
Two years later, while walking through a New Paris park in the early morning her world abruptly went dark. Her eye implants beeped and then shut down. Stumbling home, she was informed by an automated messaging system that her model of implant was defunct and the lab which created them had been shuttered.
This is the duality of Zeng-Hu Pharmaceuticals, and their cold, calculating monetization of health.
Zeng-Hu Pharmaceuticals is a mega-corporation that has assimilated almost the entire medical field into themselves. They own the patents on three-thirds of all prescription and over-the-counter medications, bio-augments, and prosthetics. Their cutthroat espionage and business leverage pried the secrets of cloning out of the hands of the Yzali Unathi Tech-Princes, and the Tech-Princes still ended up paying Zeng-Hu a substantial sum of money for the trouble.
The mega-corporation is owned and overseen entirely by the Zeng-Hu dynasty, which operates within walls of secrecy. Neither the CEO Zuiken nor his extended family are ever interviewed, photographed, nor personally attend corporate functions. Even these attendances are done in absolute secrecy, with photography forbidden.
Playable Departments
On the ship their playable departments are Medical and Research.
Zeng-Hu in Your Pharmacy
The most front-facing of Zeng-Hu is their pharmaceutical wing. Their patent on the ChemMaster 3000 and Chemical Dispensers revolutionized the speed and ease for the creation of medicines in any pharmacy across space. The simplicity of the machine allows pharmacists and chemists to create complex reagents for any occasion from simple ingredients such as acetone, mercury, and sugar. Reagents made from ingredients like these are then administered quickly and easily to patients across the galaxy, even from star ships deployed far out in the frontier.
Zeng-Hu In Your Body
The mega-corporation has a wide fleet of biomechanical organs, prosthetic limbs, and lab-grown body parts. Patients who suffer from a handicap or injury who cannot otherwise afford these can open a generous credit account with Zeng-Hu, with low interest payments set on fixed 30-year terms. Unfortunately, many of the laboratories which manage these limbs and body-parts are frequently shuttered due to the highly competitive culture within the corporation, with labs sabotaging one another. This often leads to limbs and organs no longer being supported under warranty, and the patient will be required to continue payments. If a patient falls in arrears on a Zeng-Hu credit account, the company reserves the right to remotely disable the proprietary device or repossess it.
Employees within the corporation are pressured to replace their limbs and body-parts with Zeng-Hu proprietary parts, and there are extensive bonuses for employees which take the offer. Like with credit accounts, the limbs are considered rentals and are still fully owned by Zeng-Hu even when fully installed inside an employee and they can be repossessed or disabled if the employee violates the terms of their employment contract.
Zeng-Hu In Your Cells
Cloning is one of the most controversial aspects of Zeng-Hu. Their first foray into the practice was in the 2360's, when they first brought the secrets of cloning from the Yzali Tech-Princes. Leaked internal documents showed that after The Terraces Lab Fire in 2377, Zeng-Hu executives noticed that even cloning far more people all at once than they had ever done before in tests, that every clone, no matter how damaged the original or what limbs or medical conditions were present, all ubiquitously emerged as a fully healthy copy with all ailments eliminated. The process would create a completely rejuvenated, youthful person without a trace of ill health.
The controversy arose in an unsubstantiated conspiracy about Zeng-Hu's era of "Modern Miracles" that followed. Patients with otherwise terminal illnesses or who were injured beyond the abilities of other companies to repair were enrolled in an extremely private and shrouded "Total Rejuvenation Therapy" which had a 100% success rate, eliminating every trace of ailment and injury, with even whole new limbs perfectly and seamlessly made part of the patient again. Patients would enroll with the most stubborn bone cancers, genetic diseases, or even later stages of dementia and emerge with a bill of clean health. It was an astonishing show of acumen and flung Zeng-Hu into the forefront of the medical industry as everyone who was anyone signed up for the Rejuvenation Therapy - the limit of ten patients per year created a howling demand for Zeng-Hu services on top of genuine desperation for many.
The conspiracy theorists allege that the patients were liquidated and their bodies cloned without the patient's knowledge of the incident, or with a plasteel-strength Non-Disclosure-Agreement. It's incredibly difficult to follow-up on the former patients due to pressure from Zeng-Hu's legal department which has more power than most governments. Detractors to the conspiracy are eager to point out that from what scraps of information we have on the Zeng-Hu family, all of them are known to regularly undergo Rejuvenation Therapy at least once a decade, and it's argued that surely the Zeng-Hu family isn't so obsessed with immortality as to willingly submit to the conspirators' alleged version of the Therapy.
Zeng-Hu As A Corporate Family
Zeng-Hu holds strong claims on patents of its assets. Zeng-Hu will sue for ownership of a body, legally defined by the company as an aggregate, that has over 1% of Zeng-Hu assets present genetically, physically, or physiologically. Most healthcare scanners are capable of sending private data packets for random audit checks. If an aggregate is created with proprietary assets the aggregate, or its legal guardians will be required to pay the necessary royalties. The company generously allows a 33% discount on royalty payments in such situations that it is reasonable to assume the presence of proprietary assets in the aggregate was inadvertent.
In the event an aggregate or its legal guardians are unable to pay then the issue is referred to the Zeng-Hu Legal Department for potential repossession. When an aggregate is repossessed, barring unfortunate misunderstandings of the company's legal rights to its property with local, disagreeable governments, the aggregate is placed in the care of Zeng-Hu Pharmaceuticals with a rolling credit until it is of legal age to willingly agree to an employment contract exclusive to Zeng-Hu Pharmaceuticals until the remittance of all outstanding credit to the company. At the time of the contract’s negotiation, the offered alternatives are an arbitration committee to determine which proprietary Zeng-Hu assets within the aggregate shall be returned to the company to settle the balance.
Relationships
Charon Shipping Services
All cargo flows through Charon, which means extensive fees and Charon 'randomly' inspecting cargo. Many proprietary Zeng-Hu products remain illegal in a variety of systems, and in times of feuding between the two mega-corporations Charon often flies these products through systems that will inspect then seize the illegal goods. This leverage over Zeng-Hu has allowed Charon to extort many valuable exclusivity contracts where Zeng-Hu is unable to utilize any other transit services. This reliance has long irritated Zeng-Hu, and the corporation frequently makes use of plausibly deniable assets like privateers and mercenaries to attack Charon ships.
NanoTrasen
NanoTrasen is a Zeng-Hu ally, as Zeng-Hu brings the medical expertise to the forefront and NanoTrasen brings the computing power of their research servers. This alliance is not one of mutual love; as mega-corporations both factions would love nothing more than to assimilate the other, but until such an opportunity arises the benefits of cooperation have been coldly calculated to outweigh the drawbacks of sustained corporate espionage or economic warfare.
United Nations Interstellar Protectorate
A monopoly on healthcare, alleged conspiracies on cloning use, open bribes of officials, and lobbying by populations ravaged by Zeng-Hu's medical and ethical malpractice are some of the many reasons that the UNIP has been gunning for Zeng-Hu. The effort has seen some victories over the years, but UNIP's efforts remain as effective as using speed-bumps to stop a glacier. A non-irrelevant number of UNIP firebrands that take up the cause of investigating Zeng-Hu face chronic or acute health complications which vary from a previously unknown kidney disease to collapsed lungs from an airlock explosively decompressing. But Zeng-Hu is not wholly untouchable, as factions within UNIP continue to rally to the cause of defeating this many-headed hydra.
Playing a Zeng-Hu Contractor
Zeng-Hu medical professionals suffer the stereotype of being cold, efficient, and empty of humanity. Part of the unique corporate culture that lends this image is the internal pressure that Zeng-Hu employees should wear gloves at all times. To be seen without gloves is a faux-pas at best, and an embarrassment bordering on public indecency at worst depending on the context. Their doctors are also ruthlessly pragmatic and completely lack bedside manners.
However another stereotype that is encouraged by the corporation is enthusiastic and unbreaking politeness and deference to customers, detractors, and enemies. For contractors that lean in to this stereotype, it’s important to let others know that the contractor isn’t making decisions that are detrimental to someone’s health out of malice, but unavoidable market realities.
There are also contractors that buck both of these trends. Zeng-Hu is so gargantuan and overwhelming that it’s almost a cosmic entity in-and-of-itself. To work in the medical field in many sectors of space makes a Zeng-Hu career mandatory. True believers in using medicine for good also exist within the ranks, who do their best to provide compassionate care.
The same is also true of the Research wings, with a divide between cold, pragmatic scientists and eager idealists wanting to make a better galaxy.
There are also the employees who were raised from birth, known in the legal department as “Aggregates” and as “Valued Employees” upon their employment. Whether or not they were brainwashed, Zeng-Hu tends to be all they knew in childhood. But who knows what they may think once they experience the wider galaxy and see a life beyond the company, or what they may do to take revenge.
[[Category:Lore]]